TO ALL NEW WARs: How to be awesome

[Armando]

Re: TO ALL NEW WARs: How to be awesome

Malacite, the problem with what you're asking for is that it requires rebalancing the stats on all armor pieces as well. That's really time-consuming. It throws other things out of whack too. Should a DRK using Berserk or Last resort take less damage than a THF not using either, just because he's wearing plate?

No, that's just too complicated and it risks breaking things for the mere reason that all armor pieces up to now have been designed without caring what armor type it is. The problem with defensive armors is that they only give Def and VIT. Armors with regens are rare and the regens you get suck ass. They could've gotten creative, give armor pieces with a Phalanx effect (e.g. a body armor with Phalanx: 4, subtracting 4 from all hits while wearing that), give armors with good regens, VIT amounts that aren't stupidly small, give more armor pieces with Damage Taken -X%, but they didn't. Defensive armor is incredibly lackluster in FFXI.

Also, having pauldrons doesn't magically make Haubergeon plate armor, and even if it were, it makes even less sense for a DRG to wear heavy armor because they're supposed to jump great heights. At least if your armor type doesn't make "clink clink" sounds every time you walk, you can pretend a NIN can still be stealthy wearing it.

[Malacite]

Re: TO ALL NEW WARs: How to be awesome

Should a DRK using Berserk or Last resort take less damage than a THF not using either, just because he's wearing plate?

That depends on the reduction. All I'm suggesting is something similar to shields where damage is reduced by size.

Even with a reduction, a DRK using LR and Berserk is still going to take an ass whipping due to the -35% defense. Yeah it's time consuming but not that bad. Also, you're not seriously arguing that a THF should be just as tough as a DRK are you? THF gets evasion, DRK gets heavy f'ing armor. There's your balance right there.

At least, what little I can remember from programming can't they just determine a few sets of dmg down and then designate classes (cloth, leather, chain, plate, or light medium heavy to keep it simpler) and then form a string to apply it to each item? Yeah it'll be a drag going through the entire list of armor in the game (though not if they'd done this from the start) but that's their problem.


Seriously, wearing bigger, better armor's always made a difference in RPGs. I've never seen until FFXI armor sucking so bad. Defense does help, but not by a whole lot. Sure the average damage goes down but to use your example again, a THF and a DRK will still take roughly the same damage even though the DRK is wearing much heavier, thicker armor.


I will concede it somewhat to mages since well, it's magic >_> (protect) but that's something else I've been thinking about. Why not change protect and shell to straight damage mitigation, or at least defense based on enhancing skill?

What I want to see is general melee take hits the way they ought to and make parties making them less dependent on healing magic. Support magic shouldn't be mandatory for an exp party, but more for making things go more smoothly.

Also, having pauldrons doesn't magically make Haubergeon plate armor, and even if it were, it makes even less sense for a DRG to wear heavy armor because they're supposed to jump great heights. At least if your armor type doesn't make "clink clink" sounds every time you walk, you can pretend a NIN can still be stealthy wearing it.

Tell that to Kain, he's just that strong :3

[Armando]

Re: TO ALL NEW WARs: How to be awesome

Even with a reduction, a DRK using LR and Berserk is still going to take an ass whipping due to the -35% defense. Yeah it's time consuming but not that bad. Also, you're not seriously arguing that a THF should be just as tough as a DRK are you? THF gets evasion, DRK gets heavy f'ing armor. There's your balance right there.

But THF ISN'T as tough as DRK. DRK has access to armors with higher Defense ratings. DRK also has higher VIT and HP.

At least, what little I can remember from programming can't they just determine a few sets of dmg down and then designate classes (cloth, leather, chain, plate, or light medium heavy to keep it simpler) and then form a string to apply it to each item? Yeah it'll be a drag going through the entire list of armor in the game (though not if they'd done this from the start) but that's their problem.

You're not getting what I'm saying. Yeah, they can just apply 5-10 different levels of damage reduction based on armor types and then everything will be out of whack. Equipment has Def ratings attached to them to indicate which one reduces more damage. Now armors with equal Defense will mitigate different amounts of damage based on the type, when they were originally designed to be equivalent. Higher level/defense armor sets will start reducing less damage than lower level/defense armor sets of a sturdier armor type (my Dusk gear will no longer have better damage reduction than my AF just because Dusk is leather type gear.) Armors which were supposed to have comparable DD stats will no longer be comparable because one is of an armor type that offers better damage reduction than the other (Assault Jerkin vs Haub.) In addition to that, by adding an extra layer of damage reduction (presumably %-based) you just changed the balance between players and mobs. Beacause all players will have some inherent Damage Taken -X% in their armor, mob damage will bottom out at lower numbers, and attacks which were meant to be lethal (like PM6-4 special moves) will be more manageable.

There's no way to implement a system which changes the game's numbers across the board without having to rebalance the other things in some way or another. You can't just radically change the way damage taken works and expect everything to be all honky-dory afterwards.

Imagine what would happen if all of a sudden SE changed the weapon system so that weapons of different sub-types (e.g. epees, scimitars, espadons, long swords) did different damage based on the sub-type. Weapon balance is going to be thrown out of whack. Weapons that were meant to be strong may no longer be strong because they just happened to be of a weapon type that you later decided should be weaker (regardless of the stats on the weapon or how good that particular weapon is meant to be), weapons that were meant to be weak might become strong, and other weapons might become overpowered. You would have to reconsider the stats on all weapons to make sure the system is balanced.

[Nuriko]

Re: TO ALL NEW WARs: How to be awesome

I will concede it somewhat to mages since well, it's magic >_> (protect) but that's something else I've been thinking about. Why not change protect and shell to straight damage mitigation, or at least defense based on enhancing skill?

Shell is a straight multiplier on attack strength, but Protect isn't, which is why I've added merits to Shell V but not Protect V.

[Lmnop]

Re: TO ALL NEW WARs: How to be awesome

I haven't really read much of page 5 or 6. What are we arguing here?

Last I knew: Vy mentions that /nin when you're not gaining an offensive advantage is wasteful. Armando says it's because War has less to lose by subbing NIN. Since then, this has kinda been all over the place.

Looking at WAR's ability to continue to negate damage is usually moot. All other dedicated DDs have means of negating damage on a very temporary scale. This is Chakra, this is Dread Spikes/Drain 2, this is Super Jump (a bit more proactive but still...).

If you only gain a significant amount of hate once/3 minutes, their methods are strictly better than Warrior's. So, imo, WARs sub NIN because we have more to gain. Not because we have less to lose.

[Malacite]

Re: TO ALL NEW WARs: How to be awesome

Higher level/defense armor sets will start reducing less damage than lower level/defense armor sets of a sturdier armor type (my Dusk gear will no longer have better damage reduction than my AF just because Dusk is leather type gear.)

So what? That's how it should be. Doesn't matter how tough a piece of leather may be it's not going to match a plate.

[Yellow Mage]

Re: TO ALL NEW WARs: How to be awesome

Malacite, you still don't see you're requesting something immensely unreasonable to program in to the game at this point in the first place. And broken: you are seriously suggesting a simply quested piece of mid-level AF be much more effective than an end-game armor set, just because of the materials that each was supposed to be made of? And Dark Knights would go from Glass to Diamond Cannons, and you're seriously suggesting there's nothing wrong with that?

And if you say it's all just for realism, here's realism for you: extremely heavy platemails (such as the Hauberk) were sometimes fatal to even have on at all. If the sheer weight of the armor itself didn't crush you when you fell, you would still be completely helpless to even the shallowest puddle of water. And I don't see you requesting Drown to be more effective against plate.

[Vyuru]

Re: TO ALL NEW WARs: How to be awesome

extremely heavy platemails (such as the Hauberk) were sometimes fatal to even have on at all. If the sheer weight of the armor itself didn't crush you when you fell, you would still be completely helpless to even the shallowest puddle of water.

I have always found that hard to believe. Probably don't want to derail this thread too much so I won't go into why.

And I do agree with Mal that something along those lines should have been done. I don't agree with him exactly, but something along those lines should have been done from the start. I also don't agree with the statement that it'd be too much work. Well yes, it would be alot of work. But this is a MMORPG, they've got time to readjust things and tweak things to make them better. Perhaps it's something that they should look into, and maybe it isn't.

But yeah, they'd have to work on def/vit to even things out.

[Omgwtfbbqkitten]

Re: TO ALL NEW WARs: How to be awesome

The masochistic gamer in me thinks there's more than enough damage mitigation within the game and that nothing should really change since you're all a buncha pansies anyway

Really, though, just some kind of damage mitigation ability for WAR would be more than enough.

But even then I bet WARs would find another cop-out for not tanking in EXP PTs.

[Malacite]

Re: TO ALL NEW WARs: How to be awesome

But even then I bet WARs would find another cop-out for not tanking in EXP PTs.

Probably. I just think armor type should factor in. How much so is up to the dev team. And you're thinking of the armor that Knights on Horseback wore YM. Full Plate was employed by Men at Arms as well in normal combat and isn't quite as heavy as you think.

It's still heavy and restrictive, but nothing like what Knights wore. Otherwise there would have been no point as anyone could just circle around you and jab at the joints. It never ceases to amaze me how badly video games and movies fuck up medieval combat. You'd be amazed just how effective a simple sword and shield really is.


I still don't see the issue with beefing up armor and defense in general. It's not like DRK will magically become this invincible, unstoppable force. They pull in a lot of hate and have too many masochistic abilities. I just think that at least the heavier armored melee classes ought to be able to hold their own in a fight rather than instantly becoming MP sponges. That goes double for PLDs whom I wish were more self-sufficient tanks, with say WAR being able to tank almost as well but with the need of a healer.

[ruffrydasean]

Re: TO ALL NEW WARs: How to be awesome

This DRK used Sturmwind in my PT just now and I immediately thought of this post XD

Seanr.Midgardsormr

[Karinya]

Re: TO ALL NEW WARs: How to be awesome

Becoming an MP sponge is the *good* result of taking hate from a high level mob. The bad result is instantly eating dirt.

I wish SE could think of a better way to make boss mobs more challenging than "raise base DMG again lulz", but even so, an attack that will one-shot most other jobs will take 1/3-1/2 the hp off a DEF tank. DEF matters in almost all encounters, and if you think it doesn't, you haven't played a wide enough variety of jobs.


Tanks shouldn't be self-sufficient; they should be part of a multi-person effort to keep the party alive. Too much self-sufficiency in tanks removes the need for backline jobs, which sounds great if you're one of the 9999 excess DDs LFP but really doesn't do the game as a whole any favors. SE created the problem by making NIN too good, worsened it by buffing PLD to match and adding more camps filled with weaker mobs, and now we have one- or zero-backline setups getting chain #500 on gimpy birds and any other style of play is considered a waste of time. Bleah. If you want to "fight" something that never fights back, Excavation Duty is right over there. I want the teamwork of my old Uleguerand static back - but there's no point trying to reorganize it because it really *is* a waste of time to work twice as hard for 1/4 the exp/hr of the standard slaughter of the helpless. So I just go campaign instead and hope SE will eventually wise up.

[Malacite]

Re: TO ALL NEW WARs: How to be awesome

Tanks shouldn't be self-sufficient; they should be part of a multi-person effort to keep the party alive. Too much self-sufficiency in tanks removes the need for backline jobs, which sounds great if you're one of the 9999 excess DDs LFP but really doesn't do the game as a whole any favors.

Sorry but I totally disagree. I don't see any good reason why a group of melee shouldn't be able to go out and get decent EXP without any mages (with magic users being there to optimize the EXP as opposed to being required to facilitate it.) Maybe I'm just too big of a fan of classic, offline RPGs but I don't like the concept of requiring a specific job just to earn experience (barring unique enemies like puddings and slimes).

Seriously what the fuck is wrong with armor actually working and using some items in a pinch? Or is there some reason SE doesn't want a group of 6 DD's (or any combination of jobs for that matter) to be able to just head out and kill stuff for decent EXP as opposed to conforming to specific set ups. TP burns are the closest thing we have to this but they still don't sit well with me. I'm not saying that we should just put the game on easy mode or any kind of nonsense like that. More that if all you can gather is say a bunch of warriors and monks (maybe a samurai or thief) then why shoudn't they be able to EXP using skill chains?

[Lmnop]

Re: TO ALL NEW WARs: How to be awesome

Err, some 3x DD with appropriate subs and gear can pretty much consistently get chain 4-5 on Ts with little-to-no downtime. Isn't that exactly what you're asking? Once you hit the 5- and 6-man parties, I hate the idea of homogony. It's bad enough having 3x war and 2x brd in the same party makes "the best" exp.

[Malacite]

Re: TO ALL NEW WARs: How to be awesome

Once you hit the 5- and 6-man parties, I hate the idea of homogony. It's bad enough having 3x war and 2x brd in the same party makes "the best" exp.

Yeah I agree but I'm not saying everyone should make all melee parties all the time, just that it should be a viable option. Personally it's one of my major beefs with this game compared to the other FF's that used the job system (most notably 5 and tactics) in that there's so many possible combinations and yet only a set few work.